The UK Challenge Final was an absolute farce and a complete waste of time and effort, as UKA thought it fine to invite several athletes who had not met the criteria of gaining 4 performances in their event.

This was clearly set out in the rules with the only exception of events such as the steeplechase where opportunities are limited. Therefore to allow athletes in who had only competed in one or two events completely defeated the purpose of the competition.

There was therefore no point in the series whatsoever and the competition should merely have been an open meeting with prize money.

Again it appeared to be a case of favouritism to those athletes who are a part of the UKA clique!

Here's a suggestion why not make the Challenge Final into a British Championships like the Old UK Champs so people can enter if they want. However they would get double points for the performances and bonus points for where they finished and the prize money would be given out based on your final points score not your finishing position in this one event.

It would possible mean that it maybe a 2 day meeting. If not invite enough athletes so there is a heat and final for events from 100m to 800m (including hurdles) and invite 12 athletes for the field events.

Sounds like a good idea to me. There is little point in it being a series of competitions if the points mean nothing at the end. Top points scorer should win.

I agree the atmosphere was quite dull and more people would have improved it, but I also think that UKA had no right to change the rules last minute just to improve the event for them.
The athletes who were deprived of becoming Challenge Champions have lost their titles to people who shouldn't have been there.

Needs better planning next time - it was very predictable that lots would drop out this late in the season.

I do understand that UKA (paul aldridge and Cherry Alexander are looking for feedback from people and are keen to hear of ways to improve the event.

I do believe they tried hard to stick to inviting people who had done 4 events but then may have had difficulty filling field, which is then not that helpful or fair to the people who were going to turn out.

I really like that idea. Makes for a lot more interesting event. I think the UK Challenge has a lot of potential IF people took it seriously. For those not competing at the Worlds/Euros/OGs it is a great opportunity to double/tripple periodise their year and for coaches to gain experience in practicing a double/tripple peak.

So other than the track (which some people like and others don't) on the whole you don't think a UK Challenge final as a UK champs is a bad idea.
And points are won towards the UK Challenge and then prize money given out.

I was annoyed that somebody who competed in the final and in my event was actually 7 places below me and I did not get an invite. They had competed in 4 events but had scored less than me on every performance so why did I not get an invite?

I had a response from UKA as to why I wasn't invited to the UK challenge final - they didn't have my phone number! It also appears that there were a large number of athletes that they didn't have contact details for. Surely if they knew they needed to contact people they'd ask for the details at some point and having competed in 8 challenge events I think there was ample opportunity. Also, why didn't they contact the club or javelinwebsite they know I run? Hope that people who also missed out can contact them and give them their details in case they miss out in the future.

The response from UKA:

In response…

It’s a very plain and simple answer Jim…we have no records of your contact details.

For the UK Challenge Final we had 3 databases that we were able to use.

ThrowsFest online entry details.UKA DatabaseEuro Trials Database

Across all 3 databases we have no record of you or your contact details. When contacting over 1300 athletes to compete at the Final we had a large number of athletes who we had no record of. If we had had your contact details you would have received an invitation for the Final. If we had no records and no other way of contacting an athlete we had to move onto the next ranked athlete. This left me extremely frustrated at not being able to invite athletes who by their performances should have been invited.

I am disappointed that we were not able to invite you however can I recommend that you send me all of your contact details and I will add you to our database. If your details change then please inform me and I will ensure these are updated.

If possible could you pass a note amongst the Javelin Club and ask them to do the same. I wouldn’t want this to happen again and I actively encourage you to encourage all athletes to send their details.

My hands are tied if I do not have the information. The Challenge has highlighted this as an issue and I will work tirelessly on ensuring that we design a mechanism next year so we have at least all of the 3500 athletes details of who competed. If you have any suggestions or recommendations I would welcome the feedback.

Its obvious that you are an athlete who is improving and the Challenge was designed for athletes like yourself and I hope that next year we will be able invite you to the Final.

James you compete for the Best Club in the UK as their Best Javelin thrower. It is a disgrace that this is the best excuse they can come up with.. This year is not the first year of the Challenge series.

How long would it have taken to call the secretary of Belgrave Harriers and ask them for your details...

To right sam, all they had to do was send an email to his club asking that james contacted them, they could have done this for all the athletes they did not have contact details for at the begining of the series?

Oleg wrote:I had a response from UKA as to why I wasn't invited to the UK challenge final - they didn't have my phone number! It also appears that there were a large number of athletes that they didn't have contact details for.

I wonder if this was why they wanted an athletes database to make things like this so much easier. I wonder why we don't have one as it seems such a simple idea.

Oh yes - we didn't want one as we might have to pay an administration fee.

Duh!

I understand why some people dont want one and I cant say I'd be too pleased at having to shell out more money - but the concept seemed to have more positives than negatives and perhaps with one you would have got your competition Oleg.

(......waits for war to erupt for dring to mention the membership scheme !!)

Oleg wrote:I had a response from UKA as to why I wasn't invited to the UK challenge final - they didn't have my phone number! It also appears that there were a large number of athletes that they didn't have contact details for.

I wonder if this was why they wanted an athletes database to make things like this so much easier. I wonder why we don't have one as it seems such a simple idea.

Oh yes - we didn't want one as we might have to pay an administration fee.

Duh!

I understand why some people dont want one and I cant say I'd be too pleased at having to shell out more money - but the concept seemed to have more positives than negatives and perhaps with one you would have got your competition Oleg.

(......waits for war to erupt for dring to mention the membership scheme !!)

I hadn't ever heard of this idea but it sounds like a good one. I have no problem with UKA holding my details if it means I get to compete in more competitions. I'm unaware of the exact story related to this but why would it cost £20/30 for this to happen?